Charlie Simms, the owner of a development company in Ohio, makes a point that needs to be included in discussions regarding affordable housing. Housing advocates consider affordable housing to mean below market rate housing. However, as Simms writes, “When builders and developers speak of affordable housing we’re talking about how to build homes that the average American can afford to purchase.” Government regulations pose the primary obstacle to building housing that average Americans can buy. These regulations can easily add 40 percent to the price for a new house. Instead of concocting a plethora of schemes to produce subsidized housing, politicians should spend their time repealing the regulations that impede housing producers.
An editorial in the Boston Herald urges realtors to “embrace fair rules of competition.” After the 2020 election, the Justice Department announced a deal with the National Association of Realtors (NAR) that would have changed some of NAR’s “anti-competitive” rules. The Biden Administration has backed out of that deal and is considering an anti-trust investigation against the trade organization. NAR then announced that if the government is going to renege on the agreement, then it would not implement the agreed upon changes. The editorial calls this an act of bad faith on the part of NAR. As is usually the case, government officials get a free ride while private businesses and organizations get all of the blame.
Last week, Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner withdrew his support for a $15 million affordable housing project, saying that “the project has become too much of a distraction for the administration’s agenda and for this city.” Interestingly, this announcement comes a month after Tuner fired the city’s housing director—Tom McCasland—after McCasland accused Turner are steering affordable housing projects to the mayor’s former law partner. Turner has engaged in similar shenanigans in the past. In 2019, it was revealed that he had hired an acquaintance to an airport internship at $95,000 a year during a city hiring freeze. Whether Turner is guilty of the actions claimed by McCasland or not, it is clear that government officials can and do reward their cronies to the detriment of taxpayers.